


A Scrap of Clarity

by unsettled



Category: Sherlock Holmes (2009)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-15
Updated: 2011-01-15
Packaged: 2017-10-14 19:11:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/152500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unsettled/pseuds/unsettled
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Mirrors upon mirrors upon mirrors.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	A Scrap of Clarity

The skies were clear.

For the first time in months, so it seemed, though - _that's not true you know it's not true just the other_ \- maybe they weren't so much clear as …. emptied. Blank. Like a great hand had wiped them clean, wiped them depthless, made a mirror of the sky.

Mirrors upon mirrors upon mirrors.

Wasn't there some superstition about standing between - _never stand between mirrors you'll lose your soul your mind your_ \- mirrors? Coward laughs; peasant superstitions, as always, prove themselves false. He loves this room, loves that there is no direction he can turn and not see Henry, see Henry and Henry and Henry, as present before his eyes as he is always in his mind.

They seldom use this room. It's intimidating, to be sure, but there's something - something that - something about the way things reflect, people are silly, are mindless fools, are so easily scared. They won't come, or they won't stay, to audiences held here, or if they do, they're fair useless, constantly staring at reflections. The vapid ones constantly adjust the line of their pocket watches, the crease of their cravats, a faint strand of hair.

The ones with half a brain mutter about seeing things out of the corners of their eyes, turn to look behind them too obviously, tend to turn tail and flee - there's no other word for their leave-taking.

The ones worthy of Coward's, of _Henry's_ attention, may see things. But they're too clever to show it.

Coward rests his fingertips a breath above the glass. Grins. He wonders what they see.

Wonders if it's the same as what appears to his vision, wonders if they see Henry as he does, see the swirl of boneless, formless creatures swarming the air around him, hungry, longing, possessive. He'd courted them, long ago; but Henry need never lower himself so. They wait on him like the king he - _crown crown crown can't be a king without a_ \- is, the king he's been named. Wait, give themselves over eagerly, let Henry drain them dry for one touch, for the moment of feeling before they collapse inward into motes of dusted light.

Coward wonders what it was that made Henry chose him. He doesn't remember. It's difficult to recall what it was like to be as changing as that, as fluid. He only faintly can taste the memory of power, of oranges, of looking at the world and knowing its immaterial, that it persists only by his whim.

He remembers better the moment he'd held up his hands, strangely shaped things, and looked at Henry between - _looked at the devil the monster the beast oh how he wanted_ \- the screen of his fingers. Remembers Henry's lazy eyed look of pleasure. Remembers setting a toe on the chalked lines and smudging them, inching over to the human side, the flat, half lit side. He'd stumbled when he crossed, felt the snap and unfurling of something unusual within him.

Remembers better how Henry had caught him, had pressed his palm against Coward's, slide it to curl his fingers in the spaces between Coward's and tug him forward, the eager press of Henry's lips against his, how dizzy he'd been. Drunk. Drugged.

He hadn't been helpless, even then, but - _like those poisoned waters singing the memories stolen away Lethe Lethe what other dream could it_ \- it'd been such a near thing.

He's been staring at the mirror too long; Henry has snuck up behind him, placed his gaze on Coward's, over his shoulder. His hand rises, as though to touch Coward, as though to once again wipe away his memories, his mind, his fortitude, turn him blind to anything but want, and Coward breathes out, lets his hand fall flat against the glass.

It shatters, bloodying his palm. Shatters; yet there is still a reflection, another mirror behind the first, like before, but oh. Oh.

Henry doesn't scream, doesn't make a sound; they're too quick for that, too thorough. The littlest curls on Coward's shoulder; he raises his other hand to caress it and brings it back sticky with the shadowy remnants of a soul.

They've been so hungry, his loves.


End file.
